<p>No, my two closest friends haven’t even started applying to college yet.</p>
<p>That’s one thing I love about CC- I DON’T know anyone in real life.</p>
<p>He has some A+'s which is a 4.33. An A is a 4.0</p>
<p>Most of my friends from high school went to a top university. We all graduated in the top 20 of our class of 500-600.</p>
<p>Almost everyone at my school…</p>
<p>But that’s how it always is in the Bay Area</p>
<p>@stylishsmartie, no. I don’t mean that in a rude or offensive way at all, but no. At some schools (I think we both know which ones I’m talking about), it is more cutthroat than CC, but at others, definitely not.</p>
<p>My high school was full of CC types.</p>
<p>Kids usually get into Harvard, UChicago, Northwestern, Columbia, Stanford, MIT, Dartmouth, Princeton, Yale, Duke, and the list goes on. Like seriously if you look at the top 50 schools on US News at least one kid got in from every class. It’s a good to be in an environment like that, but it definitely has it flaws. </p>
<p>Imagine being on CC all day, 5 days a week. That is how it feels for me. Kids winning that, creating this, leading this, leading that, one kid even worked in a Northwestern lab on a cure for cancer (I kid you NOT). It can be very depressing for someone like me who is above average but not at a CC-type average. Not to mention my GPA is so ughhh. But on the bright side, a good percentage of those kids have had a positive affect on my life. I’m now pushing myself to be the best I know I can, unfortunately I just started doing that this year (junior), If only I started freshman year like everybody else. Well, no point in dwelling on the past.</p>
<p>LOL i have the same act score, and i got a 236 on my psat, so if i ever complain about the amount of hw i have from my ap’s, people tell me to shut up because im going to harvard anyway. little do they realize that having two good standardized testing scores isnt enough for the ivies. i wish it was though, standardized tests are about all i have :(</p>
<p>Unfortunately yes…</p>
<p>I like to use the analogy of athletic superstars, because it is easy to identify and track them through local newspapers and reputation. In any city, there are a handful of high schools that produce multiple Division I football/basketball scholarship athletes every year. A kid at another high school might be the best athlete in the history of the school and set every record yet not get a sniff from recruiters. It doesn’t make sense to casual observers, including most parents at the smaller high school, but the best from that school simply wasn’t good enough for Div. I.</p>
<p>Even at the powerhouse schools, a kid might be a standout in his class but too small/slow for a scholarship - not the right fit. He likely has a hard time explaining why he isn’t going to Alabama when less talented kids from his school were recruited there.</p>
<p>@musicislife73 unfortunately yes…haha you haven’t seen my school. It’s a highly Asian&Indian private school where UC Berkeley is considered “bad”
There are 150 people per grade and over 50 end up going to HYPSMC, Columbia, Duke, and the other Ivies.</p>
<p>Also, not to be rude, but you don’t know my school, so you can’t really judge whether it’s considered CC cutthroat or not.
For example, I’m a junior taking multivariable calculus, and my class is filled with sophomores and other juniors. There are even 3 freshmen at my school taking taking that class.
I can’t speak for everyone but I honestly consider this very cutthroat. And I know 2 other private schools in the Bay Area similar to my school, too.</p>
<p>@stylishsmartie
i don’t go to a school as intense as yours but i do go to a private school in the bay area and everyone’s focus definitely is getting into a top college</p>
<p>similo - LOL seriously? yay for procrastination</p>
<p>I am a potentially average student that works harder than 90% of my school, but my GPA is still above average. We have a senior who recieved a call from Harvard over the summer, he had 5 APs junior, 2 or 3 honors in sophomore, and 7 APS this year. The guy has a freakin 4.9 GPA and he scored 2370-2380 on the SAT, is average looking, has a girlfriend, is president of a club and volunteers, and he hangs out with this friends on weekends. He scored 5s on every AP exam and he is 1 in the 1000 geniuses alive today. He succeeds in life where I am some of my other average friends study so hard. I go to a competitive public magnet with many extra hard classes. IDK why but less than 10% of the kids here have 3.9-4.0 GPAs with at least a few APs. I have a friend who finishes most of his work in class and has 5 APs with a 3.9-4.0 uw GPA and a girl who is smarter than the average person but works her butt off to maintain her 4.0 UW with 4 or 5 APs.</p>
<p>I go to a large public high school in NJ and I can’t say I know any true CCers. More than half of my highschool ends up going to the local community college or not going at all. Another 40% go but won’t leave NJ (we have a lot of students who go to Rutgers, TCNJ, Rider, Ramapo, Rowen, Montclair, etc.) </p>
<p>The top ten in my class is actually not spectacular at all. There is a three way tie for valedictorian (three people have a perfect weighted GPA), I am ranked 5th in my class and there is currently no 2 or 3 because of the tie. </p>
<p>The valedictorians are all extremely smart and get good grades, though I don’t believe that are much more than that… As far as I know their ECs aren’t out of this world and I know for a fact that none of them broke 2100 on their SATs. The 4th didn’t break 2000, myself in 5th had a 2140 and the boy behind me in 6th actually had
2200</p>
<p>^^^that being said, I think that says a lot about my highschool. I’m sure that I’m probably biased since I’m speaking of myself, but in my schools case I don’t believe being the valedictorian means you are the top student or one of the top three, if we are speaking holistically. My school basically never sends students to ivies or any of the other top schools. It makes me disappointed sometimes because we fell into a pattern that is probably never going to be broken.</p>
<p>@gibbons, your school sounds exactly like mine. About 90% of our students either don’t go to college, go to the local community college, or go to a state flagship university. We hardly ever send students to the Ivies, which is a shame. :/</p>
<p>In terms of valedictorian, my school is kind of weird; it doesn’t weight GPAs at all, so each year there’s about 6 or 7 different valedictorians, all with 4.0s. About 3 legitimately took a difficult course load, whereas the other 3 or 4 just got all A’s in easy classes.</p>